Joshua Tam Due to the unimaginable horrors of war, over two million refugees have fled countries like Syria, Afghanistan, and Iraq since last year.

During their travels, many refugees have found themselves without shelter.

Graduate students from London's Royal College of Art came up with something that could be useful: a coat that doubles as a tent and sleeping bag, called the Syrian Refugee Wearable Shelter.

When you unzip the side of the hood and zip up the bottom, the jacket forms a sleeping bag (with the hood as a triangular piece to rest your head). To transform it into a tent, you fill an inflatable frame with air by blowing into a mouthpiece, which gives it a rigid structure. The original prototype used rods to prop it up as a tent, but using air means its wearer doesn't need to carry anything extra.

It only takes about a minute for the piece to morph from one from to the other, Anne Sophie Grey, one of its designers, tells Business Insider.

The invention was displayed at the Global Grad Show, an exhibition of pieces by students from the world's leading design schools. The show, which was part of Dubai Design Week in late October, has become the largest exhibition of student-made design work in the world since it launched in 2015.

Joshua Tam

In the jacket's sleeping bag form, a parent and child can fit inside, and as a tent, it can fit four people. Its interior pockets can also store passports, money, and other documents.

"As designers, we feel we have a major responsibility in offering support in situations of crisis," Grey says.

Joshua Tam

The exterior of the piece is made of Tyvek, the same material often used in coats for construction workers. The interior lining is Mylar, an insulated polyester commonly used as liners for socks and gloves. The entire sleeveless jacket weighs just over a pound, Grey says.

The Wearable Shelter is not for sale as of now. The students raised $13,000 through a Kickstarter earlier this year, but are still looking for more funds to mass produce the shelters. The team says it would cost little to make on a large scale, and hope to one day give wearable shelters away to refugees for free through charities, though there aren't concrete plans to do so yet. Otherwise, each one would cost between $16 to $22.

Though the piece was originally imagined for those fleeing crisis, Grey adds that campers and outdoor adventurers could also find it useful, since it can can easily adapt to the wearer's needs.

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